Recent UK Passport Applicant Timelines

Overall resonably fast. I felt that the process got stuck from time to time (e.g. the documents did not show as received for ages). Each time this happened, I filled in the online enquiry form to ask what was going and found them very helpful and responsive then. Documents back 20th March 2026 Passport arrived 20th March 2026 Passport printed 19th March 2026 Application approved 18th March 2026 (again, this happened after I enquired) Documents received 9th March 2026 (they were signed for on 4th March, but only showed up in HMPO's system as received on 9th March after I enquired) Identity details received 2nd March 2026 Application submitted 2nd March 2026

Online process quick and easy Saturday 28 February. Posted my old passport Monday 2 March. They confirmed received 9 March. Application approved 18 March. Printed 19 March. Delivered by DHL 25 March.

2/19 Submitted, identity confirmed, Application received 2/26 Documents Received 3/9 More Documents requested and new identity referee wanted 3/9 Documents sent and identity referee confirmed identity 3/14 Documents received and after a phone call to ensure nothing more was needed and to let them know we have imminent travel. 3/15 Application approved 3/17 Printed and sent 3/18 Received at Epsom Relay @ 6:20am 3/23 DHL notification of delivery received 3/24 Passport received

Recommend calling before you send documents to ensure you send everything needed the first time. If the parent is British and born after 31 December 1982, be prepared to send lineage (birth certificates for parents of the parent of the child and marriage certificates). 2/19 : Application submitted / Identity confirmed / Application received 2/20 : Documents sent via DHL 2/24 : Documents delivered 2/16: Documents marked received 3/9: More documents requested, called to confirm exactly what was needed. Extra documents sent 3/10: Documents delivered 3/14: Called to remind we had imminent travel and ask what else maybe needed / Documents received 3/15: Application approved 3/17: Passport printed & sent 3/18: delivered to Epsom Relay / notification from DHL of delivery date 3/19: Passport delivered 3/24: Documents for passport application delilvered

They first refused my counter signer even though the person in question is a factory director then on the same day and same time they requested me to send deedpoll paperwork to a name of change which never happened and they said my name on the renewal forms doesn’t match their system when I got a call back from management I asked where they got this information from as my name never changed and if they check the two previous applications they will see it’s the same name throughout the fiat to this application the lady manager then went on to tell me that the previous applications only stay on the system for 1 year now passports for a child is 5 years so where they getting their information about the name change when if never happened. Then the lady manager could see I was in the right and then they changed their conversation and said they are requesting my child’s BC and my passport to confirm parental responsibility of my daughter.

It’s an abysmal exercise by HMPO from start to finish. No consistency, errors in website coding, still in beta form, difficult to get answers, poor communication that all of this was suddenly required, no thought to courier charges from overseas. They couldn’t have made this worse if they tried.

07/03 applied online 08/03 identity was confirmed 10/03 old passport received (this could’ve been quicker if identity was confirmed on the day and we could have sent the passport straight away. Identity was confirmed on a Sunday so had to send passport on Monday) 19/03 application approved 20/03 passport printed 21/03 passport delivered.

25th Feb - Application submitted 2nd March - Documents posted recorded delivery next day 10th March - Documents confirmed received 19th March - Application approved 21st March - Passport received

On Mon 16/03/2026 took PhotoMe photo at 10am, Applied for a passport renewal at 10:15am, sent my old passport to Hemel Hampstead via Royal Mail signed for 1st class at 11am. On Tue 17th, 6:30pm received "We've received your old passport" text. On Wed 18th, 4:45am received "Your passport has been approved" text. On Wed 18th, 10:45am received "Your passport has been printed" text. On Thu 19th, 2pm received new passport via Royal Mail. Took 4 days in total! :)

Application submitted 12:10pm on 17 March 2026 Application received 12:11pm on 17 March 2026 Documents received 2:42pm on 18 March 2026 Application approved 1:55am on 19 March 2026 Passport printed 6:39pm on 19 March 2026 Passport delivered 11:29am on 21 March 2026

Despite my British passport and French passport not having matching names (French passports typically list the maiden name and married name), my renewal has just been approved with no issues apart from them not liking the photo. They obviously had someone on a late shift at the Passport Office tonight who was bored out of their skull so after the message from them saying the photo wasn't up to scratch (ironically deemed 'good' by their automated online checker), I immediately uploaded the same one but digitised in different lighting (at my office at work, which has no natural light, as opposed to the one I originally sent, digitised in natural light), and the passport application was approved 2 minutes later (even though the new photo had equally ironically been deemed 'poor' by the same automated online checker...!). I had been expecting to have SO many problems with this because of the not-matching-names thing, so in anticipation of this, threw in a copy of my marriage certificate and a letter explaining why the names do not match (not to mention that they changed my maiden name on my old British passport into my married name using that exact same marriage certificate, so they would have been hard pushed not to accept it this time IMO). In the end the whole process was pretty seamless. As I am abroad, the passport was sent via DHL, who attempted to deliver on Wednesday 18th March; when nobody was home, I rescheduled delivery for Friday 20th March, which was when the passport was delivered - less than one month after applying for it (not bad in the context of an overseas application).

Docs took 5 days after delivery to update. After 10 more days we were asked for additional docs. They were signed for and two days later the application was approved.

Application submitted 22/02/26 Passport signed for 25/02/26 Status updated to passport received 02/03/26 Application approved 10/03/26 Passport printed 11/03/26 Passport delivered 12/03/26

Application Submitted: 15th March Documents received: 18th March Application Approved and printed: 19th March Delivery due 20th March